Survivalism
by Flood4
Summary: A small group of soldiers escapes the wreckage of the Pillar of Autumn. Soon, things begin to go wrong and people have to fight harder than they ever had just to live. The soldiers begin to do whatever is necessary to survive. Full summary inside.
1. Summary

Summary/Introduction

A small group of soldiers escapes the wreckage of the Pillar of Autumn. They find themselves alone and without any backup in the wilderness of the alien planetoid that is Halo. They soon come upon the Helljumper Squad 15. Things go well at first, but things start on a steady decline. Soon, chaos reins as they battle to stay alive. People start to do anything to survive. And they do anything to prevent others from surviving.


	2. Crash Landing

Chapter 1

Crash Landing

The Pillar of Autumn was going down. Sergeant Edward Grant knew that for certain. So, he had gathered all the men he had come across and battled his way to the escape pods. He had lost three along the way, and had one with only one arm left. But now, he was safe.

The pilot in the cockpit was speeding them toward the ring world in front of them. None of the Marines or Navy crewmen had seen anything like it before. He turned from it, and looked around the vessel.

Seated with him were four Privates, two Privates First Class, one Lieutenant, and two Ensigns. He checked his MA5B Assault Rifle. He only had three clips left for it, one loaded, and two inside his pack.

The air inside the pod was riddled with fear and apprehension. One private was shaking. There was a stain from where an ensign had lost his lunch.

"Sergeant," said the Lieutenant, "what do we do when we get on the ring?"

"First, we secure our landing site. I don't know if the Covenant will be waiting for us, but better safe than dead." The others in the pod nodded in agreement.

"Then, we find Silva and the rest of the Helljumpers. They'll be making a base camp. We'll go from there."

They all nodded. One man exhaled a long sigh, and pulled out a picture of a girl. He kissed the photograph.

"Well, it'll be a while before I get back to my baby."

Grant recalled his battle through the tunnels of the Autumn to get to this pod. He had killed thirteen Grunts and two Elites. He remembered watching as one man had a plasma grenade stuck to his chest, then seeing his entrails splatter across a narrow hall, some of it hitting him.

The pilot called back to the rest of the crew.

"EST is thirty seconds! Get your weapons ready!"

They all did so. He looked around. Most of the company had MA5B's, but the ensigns had M6D pistols. One Marine had a S2 AM Sniper Rifle, and one had a M19 SSM Rocket Launcher. He had retrieved a Plasma Rifle from a dead Elite and strapped it to his belt, just in case.

Suddenly, the pod started to shake. It became very hot inside the pod, and Grant felt beads of sweat flood down his body and into his clothes and boots. He wiped his brow, and braced for impact.

-

There was a huge thump as the pod touched down. Grant's head began to shake back and forth uncontrollably with the pod's movement. But then, the shaking gradually stopped. He looked around. Everyone was shaken, but okay.

Grant stood in front of the door, rifle to his shoulder, as another Marine opened the door leading outside. The door opened, but luckily, he saw no Covenant. But that didn't mean he was safe yet.

The crew took a few minutes to secure the area. They found no traces of Covenant in the area.

"Okay. Do we have radio contact with the rest of the humans?"

"Yes," replied the pilot. He spoke into the radio. "This is pod 526, requesting pickup."

"I hear you, 526. I'll pick you up ASAP, but am currently picking up survivors of pod 487. Estimated time till pickup is two hours, depending on how the Covenant welcome us onto the ring," came the response from the other side.

"Copy that."

"Okay, soldiers," Grant barked, "we've got a little wait ahead of us. Let's scrounge materials from the pod and get a signal ready."

The soldiers got to work. After about an hour, they were ready for pickup.

"Okay. Now all we have to do is wait. You there, with the sniper rifle, what's your name and rank?"

"Sir, Ryan J. Thomas, sir. Private first class, sniper."

"Good. You see that hill over there? You get on it and scope out the area. I want a report on everything you see."

The sniper saluted, said "Yes, sir!" and hurried off to his task.

"As for the rest of you, set up a circle around the pod. Make sure we have no blind spots."

They did so. For at least two hours they waited and watched. Grant had a sinking feeling that something was wrong.

"Pilot, send out a signal again. Something isn't right."

The pilot did so. All he got was static.

"Sir, I'm not getting anything. We're alone out here."

A sense of foreboding spread over the group.

"Sir!" yelled the sniper.

"What is it, soldier?"

"We have Covenant in the vicinity! Hunters, sir! Lots of Elites, Grunts and Jackals too!"

"Aw, crap. We can't stay here. Everyone, get your stuff together."

"Where are we going, sir?"

"Does it matter?"

They all got their bags and ammunition and headed out away from the pod. Grant knew that things would only get worse from here.


	3. Shadows

Chapter 2

Shadows

As Grant ran through what looked somewhat like an Earth forest, he saw pods escape above him. His pod had been one of the first to launch. He silently wished every one of the vessels luck.

As far as he knew, they had left the Covenant forces back on the vessel far behind. But they hadn't just left without a trace. Two soldiers had set up a proximity mine inside the vessel. The first unfortunate alien to step into that pod would have a hell of a tan.

Now, Grant and his troops were moving through densely wooded area. They still hadn't gotten radio contact, but Grant figured that the ring wasn't that huge, and if they kept moving, they'd eventually run into other survivors.

As he reached the top of a hill, he quickly ducked back down. The other soldiers came to attention with quizzical looks.

"Enemies are over the rise. Approximately ten. Two Elites. The rest are Grunts. We're going to surround them. You four flank the right. I and three others will flank left. Thomas, get that sniper rifle ready and take aim at one of the Elites. Give us sixty seconds to get ready, and then fire. As soon as you hear Thomas fire, open up on the rest." The soldiers all nodded and surrounded the plot of land in front of them.

Grant snuggled into some underbrush and carefully took aim, balancing his gun on a rock. He set his sight on a Grunt that was chatting with another Grunt.

He heard Thomas fire. One of the Elites, in blue armor, fell as his brains splattered out of his head and drenched his fellow Elite. Grant opened fire, and shot his Grunt right through the head and shattering his methane mask, sending blood and gas everywhere.

The entire group of hostiles was dead in seconds. Grant checked his ammo. He had used ten rounds. He still had the majority of his clip left.

The soldiers policed the area of weapons and grenades. Grant took four, to compliment his four fragmentation grenades.

"Okay, good work team. Let's keep going."

They continued on, but were frozen in their tracks when they heard the roar of engines. Grant made a signal to hide, and they all took cover in the darkness of the woods. Overhead, two Banshees flew over. They must have heard the gunfire and seen the bodies.

Grant stealthily made his way over to the Marine with the rocket launcher. He whispered to him.

"Okay. Wait until I give the order, then fire. If they begin to land, let them. Wait until the pilots exit before firing."

The bombardier nodded. Grant silently went to another soldier and told him. He, in turn went to a few other soldiers, and soon everyone knew the plan.

Grant waited and watched. He saw the Banshees head towards ground. Excellent.

They touched down, and the drivers exited. They were both Elites. They were surveying the damage when Grant gave the signal to fire. There was a loud bang, and suddenly one of the Banshees caught fire and exploded. This caught the Elite's attention, but they were quickly cut down by the human's fire.

Grant quickly ran to the Banshee.

"Yes! Now we have a way out of this! Do any of you know how to pilot one of these?"

Everyone was silent.

"Well, it can't be that hard to learn."

Grant stepped up to the Banshee's open cockpit. He looked inside, and was just about to man the controls when something caught his eye.

"Well, what have we here?" he murmured.

What he was looking at was a heat sensitive radar display. The hotter something was, the bigger a red dot it was. And he was looking at a huge red dot only about 300 meters from his location.

He went back to his crew with this information.

"Well, good news/bad news time."

The group looked at him, wondering what he was going to say.

"Good news is, we have heat seeking radar to tell us where enemies are. Bad news is, we have a huge heat source close by."

The group grew somewhat shaky.

"We have to engage. Remember, this is just heat. It doesn't mean for sure that it's anything."

He got the crew together and they slowly made their way through the brush. Grant's pulse was pounding. It was one thing to knowingly ambush an enemy. But there could be anything over this next hill, and he wasn't so sure he wanted to find it.

Nearing the top of the hill, Grant signaled for the others to halt. He lay down on his stomach and crawled up the hill. He saw a huge alien structure, somewhat pyramid like. He had noticed a few of these scattered around when he landed. This was one of many.

"Thomas," he whispered, "get up here. Scope that place out. Tell me if there are any Covenant in sight." Thomas nodded. He look a long look down the scope, then pulled his eyes away.

"Sir, the construct is occupied by Marines, sir!"

Grant smiled in amazement. After hearing the good news, the whole group ran down to the structure. The soldiers inside were shocked at first, but then happy to see that it was backup.

Grant was met by a Marine with a sniper rifle. He told the Marine his name and rank. The Marine saluted.

"Good to see you, sir. We're holding here until backup arrives. We sent a call out several hours ago, but that was the last time we got anything but static."

"That's our story here. Well, except we didn't have a good place to hold, so we decided to move. Hope we won't be a bother. There are nine of us in total. One may need some medical attention." He pointed to the man with no arm, who was wielding a pistol in one hand. He had had some first aid, but nothing special, just some biofoam, which wouldn't last much longer.

The Marine nodded and called one of his friends. The friend led the one-armed man up to what was presumably the medic.

"Well, there are twelve of us here. Why don't you guys come inside, and we can all get to know each other."

"That sounds great."

So they headed of into the structure, and Grant had a feeling things would get much better from here.


End file.
